COUC 500 Week 8 DB Forum 2 Example

Discussion Board Forum 2: Thread and Reply

COUC 500 Orientation to Counselor Professional Identity and Function, Discussion Board Forum 2 (thread and reply)

Thread by [Student Name]

The prompt and the classmate's post are composites standing in for the course's own forum; the law, Scripture, textbooks and published studies are real; the requirements follow Liberty's public course guide for COUC 500.

Thread

My policy is a federal statute signed in October 2020, the National Suicide Hotline Designation Act, which set aside 988 as a short number for suicide prevention and mental health emergencies. The 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline began operating nationwide in July 2022, replacing a ten-digit number that few people could remember. Callers can now phone, text or chat, and calls route to a local crisis center when one is available, with backup centers answering when the local line is busy. Granello and Young (2019) describe counselors' responsibility to understand the systems of care their clients move through, and for clients in crisis, 988 is now often the first door.

Evidence supports the idea that crisis lines help. Gould et al. (2007) studied more than a thousand suicidal people who phoned eight American crisis centers. By the time each call ended, callers rated themselves less suicidal than when it started, and among those reached again weeks later, hopelessness and emotional pain had kept falling. The callers who still wanted to die when they hung up were the ones most at risk weeks later, so what happens during the conversation carries real weight.

A number alone, however, is not a system. Hogan and Goldman (2021) argue that real crisis care requires regional call centers, mobile crisis teams and crisis facilities, so that people in distress are not left in emergency departments or handled by police with little training. 988 is the front door to a crisis system, and counselors have a stake in whether anything stands behind that door in their communities.

For practice, I would add 988 to every client's safety plan, next to the names of people the client can reach first, explain to clients what happens when they call or text, and learn which mobile crisis services my county offers. Counselors can also advocate for funding of local crisis services, an extension of the professional advocacy the course has emphasized.

Isaiah describes a servant gentle enough to leave a bruised reed unbroken and a dim wick still lit (English Standard Version Bible, 2001/2016, Isaiah 42:3). A crisis counselor's first job is much the same: keep a faint flame alight until more help arrives.

Classmates: have you or someone you know used 988, and did it connect to further help?

Reply to Andrea

Andrea, you chose the federal mental health parity law and argued that it changed little because many people still cannot find counselors who accept their insurance. Your point about access is important, and research suggests the law has had at least some measurable effect. McGinty et al. (2015) found that after federal parity legislation took effect, enrollees in affected plans became more likely to use out-of-network substance use disorder treatment services, which suggests that parity reduced some financial barriers even where networks remained thin. The finding supports your concern that networks matter, while showing that coverage rules can still change behavior. For counselors, it may be a reason to understand clients' out-of-network benefits and to help clients ask their plans about reimbursement before they assume care is out of reach. Parity, in other words, works best when someone explains it to the people it protects. Do you think counselors should join insurance panels to improve access, even when reimbursement is low?

References

English Standard Version Bible. (2016). Crossway. (Original work published 2001)

Gould, M. S., Kalafat, J., HarrisMunfakh, J. L., & Kleinman, M. (2007). An evaluation of crisis hotline outcomes: Part 2. Suicidal callers. Suicide and Life-Threatening Behavior, 37(3), 338-352. https://doi.org/10.1521/suli.2007.37.3.338

Granello, D. H., & Young, M. E. (2019). Counseling today: Foundations of professional identity (2nd ed.). Pearson.

Hogan, M. F., & Goldman, M. L. (2021). New opportunities to improve mental health crisis systems. Psychiatric Services, 72(2), 169-173. https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.ps.202000114

McGinty, E. E., Busch, S. H., Stuart, E. A., Huskamp, H. A., Gibson, T. B., Goldman, H. H., & Barry, C. L. (2015). Federal parity law associated with increased probability of using out-of-network substance use disorder treatment services. Health Affairs, 34(8), 1331-1339. https://doi.org/10.1377/hlthaff.2014.1384